'Wrath of the Titans' has good CGI but a weak script
'Wrath of the Titans' is slightly better than its predecessor, but actor Sam Worthington is still an uninteresting lead.
'Wrath of the Titans' actor Sam Worthington struggles with emoting in the follow-up to 'Clash of the Titans.'
Warner Bros./AP
Wrath of the Titans picks up about a decade after Clash of the Titans, where we find Kraken-slaying demigod Perseus (Sam Worthington) having traded his sword for the mundane life of a fisherman and father to his son, Helius. (Sadly his wife Io passed away – likely because the actress playing her didn’t return for this sequel).
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One night, Perseus’ father Zeus (Liam Neeson) appears to tell him of an ominous prophecy: Mankind has moved away from the gods, causing the gods to lose their powers. This loss has consequently weakened the walls of Tartarus, the underworld prison where the Olympians banished the monstrous Titans – including Kronos, the father of Zeus, Hades and Poseidon. Zeus needs help to hold Tartarus together, but Perseus is reluctant to return to battle – that is, until Hades (Ralph Fiennes) and Zeus’ other son Ares (Édgar Ramírez) capture the god of lightning and begin to transfer his life force into the dormant Kronos.
With the fate of the world in the balance, Perseus recruits allies in the form of his old friend Queen Andromeda (Rosamund Pike) and Poseidon’s demigod son Agenor (Toby Kebbell). The trio sets out on a dangerous quest into the underworld to free Zeus, and stop the Titans from breaking free and wreaking havoc upon the world.
Clash of the Titans was a somewhat underwhelming affair (read our review), with its wooden acting, formulaic, video game-style progression, poor 3D conversion and action sequences that were more lackluster than thrilling. Wrath of the Titans is indeed an improvement upon its predecessor – but not by much.
Battle Los Angeles director Jonathan Liebesman steps into the director’s chair in place of Clash helmer, Louis Leterrier. The two ultimately prove to be on the same skill level (average), but are slightly different in terms of their shortcomings.
Where Leterrier’s signature was stiff and contrived action choreography shot at medium range using wires harnesses and such, Liebesman opts for the same kind of shooting style he used in Battle LA - namely a claustrophobic, over-the-shoulder shaky cam perspective – which will immediately turn off a certain contingent of moviegoers. The action sequences in the first film felt like overly-contrived dance routines, but in Wraththe action (especially in the first half) is a mix of blurry up-close movement and wider tracking shots that put the human actor in the foreground, running toward or away from some CGI creature in a green screen background. Stylistically speaking it’s not very sophisticated, or believable.
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